She felt ashamed to ask about him, but shortly after a gentleman who knew her said:
"It is evident that you have a surprising degree of intellectual kinship with Ferdinand Lassalle."
This so excited her curiosity that she asked her grandmother:
"Who is this person of whom they talk so much—this Ferdinand Lassalle?"
"Do not speak of him," replied her grandmother. "He is a shameless demagogue!"
A little questioning brought to Helene all sorts of stories about Lassalle—the Countess von Hatzfeldt, the stolen casket, the mysterious pamphlet, the long battle in the courts—all of which excited her still more. A friend offered to introduce her to the "shameless demagogue." This introduction happened at a party, and it must have been an extraordinary meeting. Seldom, it seemed, was there a better instance of love at first sight, or of the true affinity of which Baron Korff had spoken. In the midst of the public gathering they almost rushed into each other's arms; they talked the free talk of acknowledged lovers; and when she left, he called her love-names as he offered her his arm.
"Somehow it did not appear at all remarkable," she afterward declared. "We seemed to be perfectly fitted to each other."
Nevertheless, nine months passed before they met again at a soiree. At this time Lassaller gazing upon her, said:
"What would you do if I were sentenced to death?"
"I should wait until your head was severed," was her answer, "in order that you might look upon your beloved to the last, and then—I should take poison!"